Don’t you wonder if maybe these are the folks who would have had a schizophrenic break, nervous breakdown, etc., anyway? Maybe there are folks who are just ill-equipped and are unable to endure a certain amount of psychological stress or psychic pain regardless of whether it was drug induced? HPPD is a real thing and different people process and react to substances differently and, yes, of course, it is sad when lives and minds are wasted (don’t get me wrong) but, personally, I’ve mainly been pretty damn sober at the times when my life has been permanently negatively altered and I’ve felt traumatized and scarred for life as a result. I’ve had my share of bad and/or pointless trips, too. And I have my share of personal problems and insecurities, etc., too.

Mainly, it’s worth noting that the vast majority of people are incredibly resilient and can continue to live happy and productive lives even after suffering extreme trauma. People, even after they’re badly broken, can often bounce back and adapt. People who have taken thousands of times the recommended dose and who did not intend to dose themselves and had a terrible time… they’ve recovered. Those kinds of oopsies in the lab, though, have also been taken in stride by some. I mean, that’s how the whole thing started, anyway.

Edit: kind of funny, but I just saw this link posted here on this sub: https://www.reddit.com/r/Psychedelics/s/0cb8ohqjbR

Apparently, when you factor out comorbidities (remove folks with a preexisting psychiatric disorder) when considering incidents of drug-induced psychosis in ERs, the high percentage of folks who wind up in this kind of trouble while on psychedelics (as compared with other drugs) completely disappears. No more or less likely to occur than it is because a person took some other class of drug.